wishin' an' hopin'!

I’ve been doing a lot of work on myself, but I’m afraid that I’ll re-read this in 5 years and be like, “Who cares that you lost .8 lbs?! BRUUUUCE!” On that note, Bruce is growing in leaps and bounds and everything he does surprises me.

Today while I lazily played on my iphone, he was in his high chair eating an entire bowl of cereal, with milk, all by himself. I’ve been giving him dry cereal, but today he coaxed me into pouring in milk (vanilla soy milk). The floor wasn’t pretty, but you’d be surprised how much made it into his mouth. I was surprised. I was impressed. I looked up from my phone when he said, “MORE?” His bowl was empty.

He’s saying all kinds of things these days. The most recent are, “juice,” and “cookie,” and “ice.” All food is “more.” (Except juice, cookies, and ice, of course. And pizza…) Pizza is “pee pee,” which I can already tell is going to create a super-awkward moment in my not-so-distant future.

I was looking at his feet today while he laid in my lap, which he NEVER does, eating “corn-corn” and watching “Robin Hood.” I just marveled at those little miracles. I hate feet. I do. They’re ugly and gross. But Bruce’s feet are so cute and sweet and perfect.

Bruce also says, “guh gur!” aka “good girl!” to Jasmine when she comes in from outside. He pats his thigh to get her to come to him.

There’s so much, and I feel like it’s all happening so fast! I hope I remember to take time out and just enjoy my nearly-2 year old!

My run got rained out last night. It’s a shame too, because my mile time was outstanding, about 12:45. My one mile that I ran was a fast one. (Relatively speaking.) I’m wondering if it was because I was adequately hydrated. I drank so much water yesterday. I caught on to something, if I drink and drink and drink and drink it flushes my body of bad stuff (waste, but toxins, too, I think) a lot quicker and easier than me just trying to run it off. I used to put off drinking water because I wanted to see how low I could get the scale to go before I ingested anything on any given day. Now, it seems, the more water I drink, the less I weigh the next morning. So, the lowest I was yesterday was 228.2, and I woke up this morning at 226.8. I’m moderately excited, still anxious for 224.

Bruce doesn’t eat much and it makes me nervous. I know he’s capable of eating a lot because he has in the past, he just doesn’t. I can’t make him. Today for lunch he had half a banana, a handful of cashews, a few bites of my vegan lasagna, some popcorn and an oatmeal cookie. No dark leafy green veggies. I feel like a bad mom. I am, however, very proud of the popcorn. We made it using half a cup of popcorn kernels and 1 tsp of canola oil, most of which seems to be on the paper bag and plate in the microwave. When I divided the canola oil by the serving sizeI believe I consumed, it was a minimal amount of calories. I’m excited. Supposedly, you can air-pop in the microwave with 0 oil. I guess that’s on the horizon for us.

Joan Rivers just passed away. That makes me sad. (It’s like the news had to do a special report to beat the news breaking on facebook.) I liked her. I enjoyed her on “The Apprentice,” and marveled at how sharp she was despite being 81 years old. I didn’t really take them seriously when they talked about her being in an induced coma after some difficulty during a procedure. I just figured that she was tough and would pull through. She didn’t. Life is fragile. You are precious. Take care of you.

So, I meant to write on my birthday, and I should have. My birthday was great. My weekend was alright. Actually, my weekend was good, but I made poor choices. Poor food choices.

Let’s see, my birthday: I ran 8 miles the night before my birthday so that I wouldn’t have to do it Friday while I was in Virginia. I lost a ton of weight, got down to 225 and was so thrilled. I lost like 7 lbs. in 10 days or so. I wish I could remember what all I was going to write about. It was all good things, and I think I could have benefitted from having it available to read today. I felt new. I felt refreshed. I dreamed that I could get down to 215 for Matt and Zhiwen’s wedding (9/13) and that I’d be close to 200 by the race (10/3). It all seemed very attainable and today it all seems so beyond my reach.

Charlottesville really is detrimental to my health. I didn’t track calories. I was severely dehydrated. I ate meat. The night we left, I ate pasta primavera which, in hindsight, was probably loaded with salt and who knows what else.

I came home from Charlottesville about 232. 10 days of work down the drain in 3 days. Sucks. It’s just that same ol’ bullshit again: shed considerably, get really excited, lose track, balloon back up like the win never happened. So, then what… was that just water weight? ::sigh:: So, here we go again.

I guess I need to focus on the good. I ran 8 miles. Me. I did. Crazy. I’m so close to the goal of 10 miles under 15 mins per mile. (Actually, I am a long way from 10 miles at 12 mins. per mile, which is why the new goal is 15.) If you had told me in February that I’d be running 10 miles in October, or 8 miles in August, I would never have believed you.

I think today I need to hydrate, hydrate, hydrate today and prepare for another long run tonight. I’m nervous because there was a really striking difference in my weight when I woke up the morning after my 8 mile run last week, and I can’t help but think I was doing something wrong to accomplish that. The instant gratification felt good, but I want to make sure I’m doing this the right way.